Video Shows Jackson Refuting Sex Allegations

A video of Michael Jackson uncomfortably facing questions about allegations that the singer sexually molested young boys and others' doubts about his sexuality has surfaced on a British tabloid's Web site.

In the video, which News of the World says was recorded in 1996 during an interview with lawyers at New York's Four Seasons hotel, Jackson seems alternately embarassed, aggravated and quietly defiant.

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According to the tabloid, the video records Jackson being questioned by attorney Michael Ring, who represented a group of former Neverland employees who claimed they had been wrongfully fired.

The video shows nothing other than Jackson, his face pale, wearing a black hat, red shirt and a black windbreaker jacket. Jackson is animated, sometimes laughing or smiling -- though apparently more in embarassment than amusement.

Though an off-camera voice, which News of the World identifies as Jackson's lawyer Steve Cochrane, tells him not to answer one of the questions put to him by Ring, the singer responds to offer questions about the sexual molestation allegations against him with one word answers.

Mostly he answers in single words, sometimes covering his face or shaking his head and only during one stretch when he is discussing a written statement he is shown does he speak at length.

"When I get angry enough I write down what I want to say and what I want to talk about, to set the record straight," he says, looking back and forth from the page he holds to his questioner. "Cause you get to a point where you get tired of people lying. I get tired of situations like this, where people completely lie on me, and I'm sick of it."

Asked about the document, he says he wrote it, possibly when he was preparing for an interview.

"I think it could have been [ABC News'] Diane Sawyer, whatever the interview was I wanted to do it, I wanted to do it," he says. "I wanted to set the record straight."

He then goes on to read some of the things in the list, his responses to some of the rumors and allegations about him.

"I'm a black American and I'm proud of it. And I'm honored of it," he says. "The bleached skin rumor, which is a rumor. I don't bleach my skin. ... They say -- they once said -- I wanted a white kid to play me as a child, which was a rumor."

In his high, soft voice he reads off some of the things he wrote, which include "I'm not gay."

And then he goes on: "Don't judge a person unless you have spoken to them one-on-one, which, which is true. 'Cause what you hear is a lie."

And he defends his relationships with children by turning to biblical references and telling a story about Jesus.

"He was talking to his apostles, and they were fighting over who's the greatest among themselves. And he said, 'Whoever humble yourself like this child is the greatest among me'," Jackson said.

"Jesus said to love the children and be like the children -- to be youthful and innocent, and be pure and honorable," he says. "He always surrounded himself with children. That's how I was raised -- to believe and to be like that and to imitate that."